When Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu visits the White House tomorrow, President Barack Obama will tell him that his country could face a bleak future -- one of international isolation and demographic disaster -- if he refuses to endorse a U.S.-drafted framework agreement for peace with the Palestinians. Obama will warn Netanyahu that time is running out for Israel as a Jewish-majority democracy. And the president will make the case that Netanyahu, alone among Israelis, has the strength and political credibility to lead his people away from the precipice...

...Unlike Netanyahu, Obama will not address the annual convention of the American Israel Public Affairs Committee, a pro-Israel lobbying group, this week -- the administration is upset with Aipac for, in its view, trying to subvert American-led nuclear negotiations with Iran. In our interview, the president, while broadly supportive of Israel and a close U.S.-Israel relationship, made statements that would be met at an Aipac convention with cold silence.

Obama was blunter about Israel’s future than I've ever heard him. His language was striking, but of a piece with observations made in recent months by his secretary of state, John Kerry, who until this interview, had taken the lead in pressuring both Netanyahu and the Palestinian leader, Mahmoud Abbas, to agree to a framework deal. Obama made it clear that he views Abbas as the most politically moderate leader the Palestinians may ever have. It seemed obvious to me that the president believes that the next move is Netanyahu’s.

“There comes a point where you can’t manage this anymore, and then you start having to make very difficult choices,” Obama said. “Do you resign yourself to what amounts to a permanent occupation of the West Bank? Is that the character of Israel as a state for a long period of time? Do you perpetuate, over the course of a decade or two decades, more and more restrictive policies in terms of Palestinian movement? Do you place restrictions on Arab-Israelis in ways that run counter to Israel’s traditions?”...

...On the subject of Middle East peace, Obama told me that the U.S.'s friendship with Israel is undying, but he also issued what I took to be a veiled threat: The U.S., though willing to defend an isolated Israel at the United Nations and in other international bodies, might soon be unable to do so effectively.

“If you see no peace deal and continued aggressive settlement construction -- and we have seen more aggressive settlement construction over the last couple years than we’ve seen in a very long time,” Obama said. “If Palestinians come to believe that the possibility of a contiguous sovereign Palestinian state is no longer within reach, then our ability to manage the international fallout is going to be limited.”...

On the eve of the Netanyahu visit to Washington, President Obama gave a lengthy interview to Jeffrey Goldberg that shows a chief executive who has learned next to nothing about the world in his five years in office.

Obama isn’t good off the cuff, especially when challenged; he is far better with a prepared speech. And what emerged is an awful portrait of the president and his conception of the world.

Take Syria. Here’s what Obama said:

“I think those who believe that two years ago, or three years ago, there was some swift resolution to this thing had we acted more forcefully, fundamentally misunderstand the nature of the conflict in Syria and the conditions on the ground there. … Over the last two years I have pushed our teams to find out what are the best options in a bad situation. … But I’ve looked at a whole lot of game plans, a whole lot of war plans, a whole bunch of scenarios, and nobody has been able to persuade me that us taking large-scale military action even absent boots on the ground, would actually solve the problem. And those who make that claim do so without a lot of very specific information.”

Who are these people who have inadequate information, misunderstand the conflict in Syria, and think there is much more the United States could have done? They include both of Obama’s secretaries of state, Clinton and Kerry, his former defense secretary Leon Panetta, and his former CIA director David Petraeus—all of whom wanted much more U.S. support for the Syrian rebels. And perhaps more to the point, take the case of Fred Hof.

Hof has been working on Syria and the broader Middle East since the 1970s, first as a career Army officer and then for the State Department. He was given the rank of ambassador and the title of “special adviser” on Syria by Obama in 2012. Hof has left the government and is now a senior fellow at the Atlantic Council, where he writes regularly about Syria at the Council’s web site. He knows far more about Syria than Mr. Obama and saw the same intelligence Mr. Obama did (in fact, he no doubt read a lot more of it). And what he writes is filled with growing anguish and anger about Obama’s failure to act in the face of mass murder by the criminal regime in Damascus. But to Obama, any such criticism “fundamentally misunderstands…conditions on the ground there,” which of course only Obama really understands.

Obama’s “arguments” about Syria in the Goldberg interview are insulting to his former (and, in Kerry’s case, current) top advisers, whose advice he rejected, and misleading about their advice. He describes a situation where ignorant critics seek “large scale military action,” which is akin to the administration’s claim that those who want sanctions on Iran are “warmongers.” But that is a false description, for what was recommended time after time was serious help to the rebels, and a one-time strike (“incredibly small,” said Kerry, not “large scale”) at chemical weapons assets. So we have the president deriding those who disagreed with him—who include his top aides and top experts—and refusing, even now, to understand that his policy of passivity in Syria has produced nearly the worst of all possible worlds: 150,000 dead, 6 million homeless, and a menacing gathering of perhaps 25,000 jihadists at the heart of the Middle East.....

03-04-2014, 05:49 PM

coach

Dangerous game BO us playing. Not going to end well.

03-04-2014, 06:20 PM

DumbAss Tanker

The demographic issue is a real one, but I wouldn't bet a cent on Obama or anyone at State understanding Jack about it, the long-term way it will play out, or what Israeli stance would actually be in Israel's long-term best interests. In fact, I'd say you could reliably count on whatever course of action Obama wants Netanyahu to take, it will turn out to be about the worst possible course of action for Israel.

03-04-2014, 06:24 PM

Eupher

Quote:

Originally Posted by DumbAss Tanker

The demographic issue is a real one, but I wouldn't bet a cent on Obama or anyone at State understanding Jack about it, the long-term way it will play out, or what Israeli stance would actually be in Israel's long-term best interests. In fact, I'd say you could reliably count on whatever course of action Obama wants Netanyahu to take being, it will turn out to be about the worst possible course of action for Israel.

^^^Yep. Which begs the question: Why is Netanyahu even getting on the plane to go to Washington and be railroaded like that? Diplomacy is one thing, but flying a few thousand miles to be told to do something that cannot be considered is simply unfathomable.

Either Bibi is extremely patient with clueless shitbirds like Barry or he wants to be able to tell Barry personally to go fuck himself.

03-04-2014, 06:31 PM

DumbAss Tanker

Quote:

Originally Posted by Eupher

^^^Yep. Which begs the question: Why is Netanyahu even getting on the plane to go to Washington and be railroaded like that? Diplomacy is one thing, but flying a few thousand miles to be told to do something that cannot be considered is simply unfathomable.

Either Bibi is extremely patient with clueless shitbirds like Barry or he wants to be able to tell Barry personally to go fuck himself.

Beats the shit out of me. All I can figure is that Netanyahu wants to keep looking like the adult in the room so he doesn't have any unnecessary fences to mend if and when control of the US ever passes to an adult again. Not saying what you really think is the essence of diplomacy, after all.

03-05-2014, 11:01 AM

Dan D. Doty

Quote:

Originally Posted by Eupher

^^^Yep. Which begs the question: Why is Netanyahu even getting on the plane to go to Washington and be railroaded like that? Diplomacy is one thing, but flying a few thousand miles to be told to do something that cannot be considered is simply unfathomable.

Either Bibi is extremely patient with clueless shitbirds like Barry or he wants to be able to tell Barry personally to go fuck himself.

What Obama and his buddies want is to see the Jewish State wiped off the face of the Earth so the IslmoFascists will be happy.

03-05-2014, 04:57 PM

Elspeth

Quote:

Originally Posted by DumbAss Tanker

All I can figure is that Netanyahu wants to keep looking like the adult in the room so he doesn't have any unnecessary fences to mend if and when control of the US ever passes to an adult again. Not saying what you really think is the essence of diplomacy, after all.